Time to replace ICPD recruitment video

The Iowa City Police Department's recruitment video, "Ladies and Gentlemen/Welcome to the ICPD," was produced by Channel 4 City programming and posted on the department's Facebook page and uploaded to YouTube in October 2010 (http://twoatthefringe.blogspot.com).

Constructed around the words "professional," "progressive" and "elite," the imagery focuses on the ICPD charging around in police cars (professionalism); benignly walking or biking the downtown streets before writing citations to students (progressive); and the camouflage-dressed SWAT team in action (elite). There is nothing in the video to suggest the police do anything but confront one crisis after another nor that they might do things that serve the public more benignly.

This high-powered imagery, in particular the SWAT team portion, is reinforced by the song "Ladies and Gentlemen" by the rock band Saliva, which can be seen in the music video at www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMlKmELIhgY. This video portrays two women bloodily beating each other up in a boxing ring with one of them drinking a can of "cocaine" as they take a break before resuming their violent battery of each other. One woman gets hit so hard you can see blood spew before she drops to the mat.

At its March 2013 meeting, the Diversity Committee Report to the Iowa City Council recommended replacing the recruitment video, believing that "it is a reflection of the current culture in our police department, which is leading to much of the public's concern about negative treatment."

Using violence, sex and drugs should not be the way to recruit police officers. I hope everyone reading this will take the time to view these videos and comment as they see appropriate. There should be an investigation regarding this video to determine what the process was that led to its production and publication.